


Five Things That Aren't True

by Basingstoke



Category: Smallville
Genre: 5 Things, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-11-30
Updated: 2001-11-30
Packaged: 2017-10-02 18:51:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Basingstoke/pseuds/Basingstoke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yes, this is the first Five Things story ever written.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things That Aren't True

I. Renaissance.

He's sitting in the master bath in Lex's castle. He's not touching anything. He's scared to.

He might--

Lex's castle. God. Incredible. And Lex--more incredible. The smooth skull with the young face that makes him want to touch, rub his hands all over, kiss and lick and--

It's more of an urgent feeling than he gets for Lana. Lana makes him feel all squishy. Lex makes him feel all *hard.*

He kissed Lex quick, feeling drunk, expecting to get shoved on his ass. Lex just smiled at him though, and kissed him back. Then there was a long giddy walk down hall after hall until Lex shoved him down on the bed and then he--

then he--

then he--

There's blood. On him. All over him. And--

He doesn't know who to TELL. He has to tell someone, but--oh God, his dad will--

\--"Mr. Luthor, I'm sorry I killed your son"--

He hides his face against his knees. He's sitting in the bath. He's not touching anything. Ever. He's not touching anything ever again. Not ever...

* * *

II. Dawn.

Lex reached up his hand and caught it before he knew what it was. It buzzed in his grasp. A model plane.

"Who's there?" he called, his voice echoing around the empty school gym. The plane stilled and fell silent. He crossed his arms, tucking the plane up against the crest on his jacket.

"Luthor."

Wayne. Bruce Wayne. A year older than Lex and twice as strange. Lex didn't dare wonder what *he* was doing out of bed in the middle of the night. "Bruce? Is this your plane?" he asked, looking around.

He couldn't see anyone. The lights were off, of course, but the blue glow of the safety lights outside streamed in through the high windows. "You know, your head looks just like the moon," Wayne said.

"It doesn't have as many craters." Lex considered smashing the plane, but--not until he spotted Wayne. He wanted to see all the cards first.

"Haha." Wayne's voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Lex remembered the gymnastics rings and looked up. "Why are you bald, anyway?"

"It's the fashion. Metropolis is eons ahead of Gotham." All he'd have to do was press his fingers into the join of the wing and body...

"Haha." Movement above him--too fast to make out. "What are you doing out so late? Little boys should be in bed."

Semen still on his tongue. "I couldn't sleep." Later he'd blackmail the teacher, for fun. For practice. Father said he was cutting business deals in grade school; no reason Lex shouldn't follow that lead in his own way.

"I can't ever sleep," Wayne whispered. Something creaked above Lex. He looked straight up and saw Wayne hanging upside down above him.

Wayne's eyes were huge and midnight. "Can I have my plane back?"

Lex raised his hand wordlessly, rested the plane on his palm. It buzzed and took off.

"Goodnight, Luthor." Wayne curled back up into the shadows.

"Goodnight," Lex said, and walked out of the gym as quickly as he could without looking as if he were running.

* * *

III. Tisane.

Lex and Clark lay on the hood of Lex's car, looking up. It was just cold enough to seep through Lex's jacket from the cold metal, but not cold enough for his fireplace to beckon hm home.

"There's a lot of stars," Lex said.

"Yeah," Clark said.

Pause.

"A *lot* of stars," Lex said, and Clark laughed.

"I guess the lights get in the way in Metropolis?" Clark asked.

"I've never really noticed. There's other things to look at."

"Oh." Clark shifted. "I've been to Metropolis. Twice."

Lex looked at him. "What did you see there?"

Clark turned to Lex and grinned. "The pandas. We went to the zoo."

"Sunset Zoo isn't enough for you? Where's your hometown pride?" Lex cocked an eyebrow.

"Pandas, Lex. Pandas!" Clark giggled.

"How old were you when you saw these marvelous pandas?" Lex asked.

"Eleven."

Lex scoffed and looked back up. "Eleven, which means I was sixteen, which means there was a passing chance that I was losing my virginity at that very moment," he said, which sent Clark into further fits of giggles. Clark poked him surprisingly hard in the ribs, still giggling, and Lex squirmed sideways--right off the sloped hood.

"Oof."

Clark's head appeared. "Are you okay?"

Lex stood up slowly and made a show of dusting himself off. "I appear to be intact," he said, and paused. "Apart from my pride."

Clark looked up at him, sprawled and confused. Lex smiled and Clark relaxed.

Clark. Just a baby, for all that he looked like a man.

"Do you know why I was out here?" Lex asked.

Clark shook his head.

"This is the precise geographic center of the continental United States. I had to see."

"See what?"

"See it," and he couldn't explain to Clark the strange urge for balance, so he didn't try.

"That's cool. That we're in the middle, I mean." Clark scooted over, giving Lex room to sit down again.

They were silent for a while. The hard freeze before the current, strange, December warmth had killed off all the gnats and mosquitoes, so the night was unusually quiet.

"You don't really like your dad, do you?" Clark said out of the blue.

Lex ran his hand over his head. "It's not really a question of like. There's...a lot that comes with being a Luthor, and my father has done his best to teach me about it, the birthrights and the responsibilities. Himself, he's given me quite a reputation to live up to. Or down to. Depending on who you ask."

"Well--I guess--I don't know. Never mind." Clark looked confused again.

Lex watched him for a moment before rolling over and putting his mouth to Clark's ear. "No, I don't like him," he whispered. Clark's fluffy hair tickled his nose.

He rolled back. He could feel Clark looking at him. "That's too bad," Clark said.

"You like your parents."

"Yeah."

"Do you ever wonder about your birth parents?" Lex occasionally wondered what he'd be if he weren't a Luthor-- rather, who he'd be; how much of his identity was tied up in his heritage and his name.

Clark crossed his arms, shivering a little. "No--well, yeah-- but it's not like I'd rather be there than here. They, you know, they didn't want me. And Mom and Dad do."

Lex touched Clark's shoulder. "Everyone wants you here, Clark."

"Do you think so?" He sounded a little scared. Unsure of his place in the world, Lex supposed.

"I'm sure of it." He patted Clark's shoulder. "Are you ready to go back?"

"No. I mean--if you don't mind."

"I don't mind." Lex crossed his arms and looked up at the stars.

* * *

IV. Sleet.

"Who are they for?"

Clark jumped. Lex was standing just behind him, admiring the rose display over his shoulder. "Um--I was just looking. My mom's rosebushes got pounded in the last storm," Clark said.

"All of them?"

"Except for the one in the lee of the house. That only lost half its petals." Clark shrugged. "Storms are bad here. It happens all the time."

"Yes, I *know,* Clark. I'm not entirely new to the area." Lex raised an eyebrow at Clark and reached past him. "Pink? Or yellow?"

"What?"

"Roses. For your mother. You can tell her they're from you if she wouldn't take them from me." Lex handed Clark a wrapped bouquet of pink roses and walked over to the floral counter to pay.

"You don't--"--have to do that, he was going to say, but Lex just gave him one of those *looks.* Clark sighed and handed the roses back to Lex when they were paid for. "Hold these while I check out."

Lex looked in the basket. "You don't grow sugar cane or peanuts? I thought you were self-sufficient."

"Mostly." Clark smiled, finally, and fought the cart up to the front of the store. Lex followed him. "Wow. Looks like the rain is picking up," Clark said.

Sheets of water cascaded down the front windows and seeped in under the door, which blew open in a sudden gust of wind. One of the bagboys ran to hold it closed.

"I'll have to do something about the weather here..." Lex said. Clark stared at him in astonishment--could he? would he? did they?--but Lex winked. Joke. He wandered up front; Clark blushed and set the groceries on the checkout belt.

The clerk shook her head. "The sun was shining fit to beat the band when I came in not half an hour ago. I'll tell you, Clark, I never get used to it."

"I just hope it blows over fast," Clark said, handing over his money. "I still have deliveries."

"Can't be much longer. This sounds like the worst of it." She gave back his change. "Good luck, honey."

"Thanks." Clark picked up the bags of groceries and went to join Lex. It probably would blow over; rain this furious never lasted more than ten or fifteen minutes at a time. The only problem was if it brought--

There was a sudden, deafening clatter on the roof.

Hail.

Lex looked up. "Is that--what is that?" he shouted over the racket.

"Hail! The flat roof makes it echo!" Clark pointed his chin at the parking lot as the hail began to set off car alarms. Lex's car alarm, for one.

"Shit!" Lex pressed his hand to the window, staring at his car. Clark blinked and looked through the rain--through a car--focused on the hail. Golf ball sized. It would leave dents in all the cars out there. The people around him started groaning as they realized this too.

Clark's father's truck had plenty of dents already; a few more wouldn't make much of a difference. But Lex--oh, man, Lex's car. Clark didn't know what he was driving that day, but it was sure to be sleek and expensive and *fragile.*

The racket died down to a patter, and then to the gentle drops of normal rain. Lex bounded for the door, Clark on his heels.

He stopped dead in the parking lot.

Lex's car. Little balls of ice. Dents all over the hood. The windshield broken.

The safety glass was broken between the plastic sheets, making the windshield nothing more than a mosaic of green-white fragments, impossible to see through. Lex clicked off the alarm and walked toward it slowly.

"Oh my word..." The clerk stood at Clark's shoulder.

Lex touched the hood with a trembling hand. He seemed oblivious to the rain slowly soaking him as he laid the bouquet of roses on the broken windshield. Clark pushed his wet hair out of his eyes as Lex walked back toward him.

Lex smiled a little. "I'm sorry about the roses, Clark, but I found myself with an unexpected funeral to attend."

"That's okay."

"Can you give me a ride home?"

"Sure."

* * *

V. Viceroy.

"Lex, my boy," Lionel said. "It's time to go."

He was leaning against a Porsche in the drive, his eyes hidden with dark glasses. Lex paused in the doorway. "Where? I have a meeting in half an hour," Lex replied.

"Oh, that's not important any more," Lionel said, grinning wolfishly. "The thousand years are over. Come with me."

"Business isn't important?"

"Come with me," Lionel repeated, and he removed his sunglasses with one hand as he reached the other toward Lex. Then Lex was moving without moving his feet, dragged along the ground. His father's eyes were red and burning.

Lex's vision went black. He felt briefly as though he were flying.

He blinked and he was in a room, cubical, jet black, and vast. "Father, what--"

"The thousand years. Revelations, my boy. The second stage of the end times, when our armies fight the armies of the saints." Lionel ran his hands over Lex's head, leaving small, jutting horns in their wake. "There. Horns like a lamb, just like you used to have. Say the words and we'll begin."

Lex would have asked which words, but he suddenly knew; they were on the tip of his tongue, crowding into his brain with a host of ancient memories too strange for him to fully comprehend.

"Wait," Lex said.

His father looked at him, his eyes flickering with inner fire.

"You've never *asked* me to do anything. Just ordered me, or made it happen around me."

His father bared his teeth but was silent.

"But you're asking me to do this..." Lex stood up straighter. "You can't force me to obey you."

"I liked you better before, Beast. You never used to be so...willful."

Lex smiled. "I like this world, Father. I won't destroy it."

His father slid his hands down to Lex's throat, pausing for a moment before bursting into laughter. "Lex, Lex, Lex!" Lionel draped his arm around Lex's shoulders and walked a few paces. The room shifted around them, becoming the driveway of the castle once again. "I see I should have bought you that pony when you were six."

"This isn't just rebellion." Lex was offended at the idea.

"Oh, of course not. You're young. You've got some farm girl on the side.... I'm a patient angel. I can wait." Lionel smiled broadly.

"You'll be waiting a long time."

"You'll be waiting forever."

Lionel laughed and took out his sunglasses. "Just you see, son. You'll hate this world yet." He donned the glasses and vanished.

Lex pinched himself. Apparently, he wasn't dreaming, unless he suddenly had very persuasive dreams.

He walked over to his car. A cappuccino sounded good. He needed to clear his head. He needed to think, long and hard. He needed to find out what powers his father had awakened. He needed to find out how to exploit them.

Unbelievable. The townspeople were right. His father really *was* the Devil.

When he put the keys in the ignition, he glanced in the rear view mirror and noticed the horns still on his head.

end.

* * *

all comments are welcome.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * A [Restricted Work] by [Teland](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teland/pseuds/Teland) Log in to view. 




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